Fallen Semicolons Go to Valhalla

Listen up, movie writers. You need to understand something: The 80's are long over. Those of us who participated in that decade have since grown up, gotten jobs (and lost them, too), started raising families and are generally ready to leave that time behind us.

Sure, there are a few things that I look back on with some nostalgia: Amber colored LCD's, the original WD21 Nissan Pathfinder, and Below the Root... but one thing I do _not_ miss is the novelty of being a nerd.

Thankfully, it's not novel. All the ridiculed, socially awkward, intellectually-inclined population of Earth has grown up to be perfectly normal human worm babies.

But people in the entertainment world haven't gotten that memo yet. They're still enamored with the idea of portraying the nerd as some sort of charming martyr for the cause of being smart or something -- even tho' that stereotype has worn right thru' the soles of its shoes, the skin of its feet, the marrow of its foot bones, and is now lying dead on the trail of literature --- right along with the notion that all people wearing red had best stay clear of away teams.Many writers still seem to think that giving a shout-out to the world's most unspectacular subculture is an automatic +20 modifier to the show's appreciability.

I call it the Chuck-Sheldon phenomenon: The fallacious assumption among writers that references to something even remotely geeky is a valid substitute for actual writing talent.
I'm generally prejudiced against shows that cry: "I AM OF OR RELATED TO COMPUTERS AND THAT MAKES ME SPECIAL." But every once in a while, you see little nuggets of appreciability in even the tiredest Hollywood cliches...
Enter Tron: Legacy

1. Legacy is Evil
Even if you can scour the trauma of Swordfish from your memory, the portrayal of computer g

eeks in pop culture has been depressing. The

issues that movie writers try to touch on are usually fabrications of an uninformed mind or retarded mimicry of a journalist satirizing the reality of what matters to us.

Surprisingly, there were (few) moments when Tron tried to not suck at discussing the plight of the programmer.

Sometimes we programmers think that the code we're working on is awesome. Sometimes we just have to do it. But all programs require maintainence and it's not entirely uncommon for the author of a program to be a victim of his program's success: Being trapped in contracts that require revisiting the same, boring code day in and day out.

As technology ages, we find it less appealing. Then we grow to hate it. It appears to hate us. It traps us. Enslaves us. Legacy code becomes a tyrant. This was more literally true for Kevin Flynn and Clue than it is for most of us but it's still true.

This marks an unusual ability for a movie to actually capture an issue of relevance to computer geeks in an almost reasonable way.2. Your Darling Will Kill You
Every programmer has a little darling: A pice of 1's and 0's that he is absolutely certain is the sexiest thing ever to spring from a keyboard. Naturally, the elegance of this code is entirely illusory. It's not uncommon for one to imagine his work to look like this:

But in reality, it actually looks like this:

You think it's hawtness digitized but its really just silly cruft. You think she's lacerating off your clothes but she's really just dolling you up for your gladiatorial demise. All programs, no matter how appealing they may seem, are out to betray you.

Your masterpiece will become a genocidal madman. Your kingdom will become a prison. That program is not wearing high heels for your benefit.

You can't trust software no matter how much you love it.

3. Nerds are too generic. Go for Unix dweeb!
Truth is: Each person in the developed world that isn't collecting Social Security checks is at least 40% geek. Some of us are more geeky than others and a few grandmas out there still refuse to accept WiFi anything but witchcraft but they're the exception rather than the rule.

Because of this anti-novelty of geekiness, if you want your geek movie to stand out in the crowd, you're going to have to get a little more specific than the general purpose encyclopedians with bandaids on the bridges of their glasses. Where some shows have been content to throw in Cameos of Leonard Nimoy or Mark Hammil, Tron goes for broke and introduces the biggest stars of all: whoami, history, kill -9, and grep.

It's really quite strange to see a movie do this. I'm not used to seeing an interface portrayed as anything other than Media Player visualizer effects. But there it was: a decent imitation of real computer interfaces.

But that's where Tron's appeal seems to end and we're stuck with Hollywood turning embarrassing once again...

4. RMS Lives!1!1!!!one!... in a dumpster
There is nothing more amusing than movie writers trying to capture the spirit of a big, philosophical issue in a franchise-milking action film.

CEO: "u no can haz prohgarmz! iz 4 prawfit. kthkbai"

Conscience: "teh b

itz want 2 be fr33!!!!!"

It has been demonstrated that a thousand Apple fanboys on a thousand typewriters, can write a $43million sequel as long as there are 2^3 or more motorcycle stunts in it.

That painful, "trying too hard" feel was all over the first jazillion picoseconds of the show and I was quite glad that, once the story actually got started, it stopped screaming "disregard my lack of merit and appreciate the fact that I acknowledge the existence of people who use digital computing devices!"

Overall, I think Tron: Legacy did a decentish job given what it had to work with. It was cute. These four lessons were valuable ones to learn and, shock of all shocks,

I think that the movie Thor actually took those lessons to heart. The similarities abound.

1) rm -rf was invented for legacy code
If legacy code is an oppressor, Thor takes his mighty hammer to that oppresor's face. Does an aspect of actual Norse mythology stand between you and a good time? Don't refactor it: Rewrite it. Little, if anything, was really preserved from the premise this story was founded upon... except that there's a dude with a hammer who is called a deity.

I'm okay with that. He doesn't need to stay the ginger patron deity of oak trees, live in a retconn that alludes to incest, wear iron gloves, or have a giantess for a girlfriend to be cool, IMHO.

Of course, rampant modernizing comes at a cost: You tend to mutate the social issues into the silly, non-specific badness. Even still, Loki's badness had more appeal than Clue's general evahl: Digital Aryans are mostly goofy clichés by now. Psychotic, killer deities, however, are awesome goofy clichés.

2) Killing is what darlings are for

Thanks for spelling that out for us.

No disrespect toward Natalie Portman but we all know the real love interest in this show was Mjölnir. And what a lovely love-thing she is. She's far more loyal than any lover made of meat (while the whole of New Mexico tried to fondle her, she wouldn't budge) and doesn't hesitate to make the heads of enemies go concave.

Yeah, they had a little stint where Thor had to sleep on the couch but that's normal in even the healthiest relationships.

And this darling doesn't pull the Bond Girl gimmick and turn all venomous serpent on him later. She's got some clear and unrelenting standards as to the kind of man who will wield her and she'll smash the ever-loving squick out of anybody who threatens her man.

Unlike the horrible Delilah that software is, weapons are good, just, faithful, and precisely as sexy as they appear to be. This cannot be disputed.

3) Authoritarians Exist. So smash them.

I forget.  Which franchise is this again?

The only movie that gets to substitute progress bars in for actual suspense was Office Space. Thor accepted this and actually just used real suspense. Those of you who know your stuff were far more immersed in the moment when Hawkeye was threatening to shoot Thor than you were by some punk trying to fill his iPhone with warez.

A god doesn't fight The Man by putting his trade secrets up on Torrent Sites; he smashes secret government agents into muddy craters. He doesn't try to justify it either with lame nonsense like "but I'm the biggest shareholder!" He doesn't need to justify himself to you at all. He's a god. You're a puny mortal.

4) Nerds don't need overt platitudes
While Tron vested great effort in hooking somebody like me, Thor showed that such work wasn't really necessary. Natalie Portman, admittedly, has far more staying power than grep ever could (though I do like grep). Show a few better-than-real shots of nebulae, a pair of reasonably attractive ladies, and a bad-arsed dude smashing things with a mountan-crushing weapon... you're pretty much done.

Where Tron said "You are a nerd. Ergo: Appreciate me." Thor said "hey we're both nerds. Incidentally, let's have fun!"

I appreciated the fact that Thor was a little more grown-up its nerd heritage. It didn't need to rub the nerdiness in your face like the kid who'd just learned that cuss words were supposed to be offensive. It wasn't a proselyting nerd. It wasn't a violently insecure nerd. There was just wholesme nerdy violence.

The only way it could've been better is if you got to see Kat Dennings grepping thru hubble images while wearing spandex LED's.

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